Common Goals
by xenzen
Summary: Created for Dueling Challenge #23, "Odd Couple": Desperation and necessity turn two would-be enemies into reluctant allies.


_"There's something very important I need you to do, and I don't trust anyone else to do it right. Please, Carth?"_

While it was flattering and deeply ironic to hear that, couldn't he have gotten a few more details besides 'it's very important'? Carth sighed as he looked at his datapad. The ass-end of Dreshdae smelled exactly like that, and he wondered if he had the right address. What could be so important here that he'd been dragged away from the frantic preparations to leave the planet?

"I see they sent a slave to do the dirty work. As usual," said a dry, familiar voice from the alley behind him.

Carth whirled around, a blaster in his hand and a snarl twisting his lips. "You!"

Yuthura Ban just lifted one elegant purple eyebrow, her dark gray uniform blending into the shadows.

"What the hell do you want, _Sith_?" Carth spat the word like an curse. _Now I know why no one told me anything. Somebody's got some explaining to do when I get back to the ship._

"Help."

"And why the hell should I help _you_?" He didn't holster his blaster. That someone like _her_, after everyone she'd done and help do, would have the gall to ask _him_ for help was grotesque. Carth found himself toe to toe with Ban, snarling into her tattooed face, "I'm not going to help the _Sith_ that --"

A small, muffled whimper coming from the vicinity of Ban's knees cut off his diatribe and made him look down, so surprised was he at hearing something so unexpected. A small round face stared up at him from wide, tear-filled eyes; the little boy clutched Ban's leg and shuffled behind her.

Ban laid her hand gently on the kid's hair. "Hush, child. Be calm." Her face, at once tender and a little regretful, turned hard when she looked back at him. "I need no help for myself. But I cannot bring them to safety and also defend them at the same time, not after the disruptions your fellow 'slaves' caused in the academy."

Carth saw ten or a dozen more in the alley behind Ban, some calm, some crying quietly; all were huddled behind the Twi'lek. The youngest couldn't have been more than six years old.

"What? Where did they all --"

Ban gathered the children with a wave of her hand; the older ones carried or led the smaller by their hands. "As a soldier, surely you would know. In any war, both sides must recruit new forces where they can. The Jedi and the Sith are no different." Ban took the hands of the children and began navigating her way through the alleys. Carth was forced to follow.

"Like Dustil?" Carth snapped, and lowered his voice when the kids winced and shrank away from him.

Ban nodded. "Like Dustil. These are the dispossessed, the scorned, the discarded, the _abandoned_" -- Ban smiled at Carth's flinch -- "and all are collected if they have the Force."

"They're just kids! H-how could you even think about what you're going to put them through --"

"It's a kinder fate than any they'd find on Nar Shaddaa. Or Sleheyron. Or even Coruscant." Ban's violet eyes flashed, giving the lie to her dispassionate voice and expression. "But I will not leave them here to be exploited by Czerka, nor will I allow them to be harmed by the careless whelps running around in the academy. Distasteful as it is, they can only be safe with the Jedi on Coruscant."

"I bet you'd get a lot of credits selling them," Carth shot back. "Especially Force Sensitive ones!"

Ban's lips twisted. For a second Carth thought she'd draw her lightsaber. "If you truly believe I would do that, then why are you still here?" she said after a moment.

Well, there was nothing he could say to that, could he. All he had was someone's word that this, this _Sith_ could be trusted. Carth fumed and glared at Ban's back, finally noticing that she was moving stiffly, with a limp that became apparent when they were forced to step around and above Dreshdae's garbage-strewn streets.

"Why didn't you bring a speeder?" Carth muttered, helping Ban hand the children up and over a small hill of crates and trash blocking yet another noisome alley. The kids didn't flinch away from him anymore, but it was clear they were still afraid of him. What could've happened to them that they'd see _Ban_ as their protector?

"It would attract undue attention," Ban replied as she set off again. Carth didn't see how she could find her way in this maze; he was already lost.

"We're nearly there," she said to a kid who looked limp with exhaustion. It didn't escape Carth's notice that Ban was sneaking glances at her chrono more and more frequently.

Carth hesitated, then knelt down, putting him on the kid's eye level. "Come on, I'll give you a ride, okay?" He beckoned with his open arms. The kid shrank away from him, and looked to Ban for reassurance.

"It's all right, child," Ban said. "He means us no harm. Remember what I taught you?"

The kid stared at Carth, and it seemed to him that she just kept on staring right through him; it was disconcerting to see in a child not much older than five. Finally she nodded.

Carth put her on his shoulders, suppressing the memory of him carrying Dustil like this when his son was small and too short to watch parades and games. Ban gave him two more to carry in his arms. "I won't be able to help much like this."

"Let us hope it won't be necessary." Ban pointed ahead to where Carth could see the spaceport. "We haven't far to go."

His heart sank when he realized what their destination must be. "Th-they're not all gonna fit," Carth whispered. _They're not all gonna fit on the _Hawk.

"I thought ahead," Ban said, hustling their charges through an old, damaged docking bay door. "I still have some small authority here, and a Czerka freighter captain who owes me some favors will be waiting for us." She paused. "But I thank you for the thought."

"You sure he's gonna be there?"

Ban's smile was cold and thin as a knife blade's. "He will if he values his choobies."

The children were about to pass through the other side of the abandoned docking bay when they all turned and ran back to them, screaming with fear.

"Quickly, get back!" Ban cried. The hiss of her red lightsaber was loud in the silence, and the lurid illumination it shed was reflected in the eyes of three sentients, dressed like Ban.

The children's fear of the strangers overcame their reticence of Carth, and they piled in behind him. Carth put down the kids he was carrying, and pushed them into what little cover could be afforded by a pile of plasteel containers. He drew his blasters.

"_Master_ Yuthura," one of the sentients said. "Leaving so soon? And we still have so much to learn."

"There is nothing more I can teach you," Ban said, "because there is clearly a limit to what your tiny minds can hold. Now stand aside."

"Or what? You'll punish us?" another one said. The speaker's eyes shone with a bright, ambitious light. "We hear Master Uthar's dead, and if you're not going to take his place, one of us will. And we'll get no argument from the rest if we hold your severed head-tails in our hands. _Master._"

"You're welcome to try, children." Ban shifted her stance, lightsaber held ready.

Carth interposed his body between the fighting Sith and the children, his heart torn between wanting to see Ban dead, and wanting her to survive. If she died, he knew what his chances would dwindle to. He rummaged in his pockets, coming up with nothing more useful than discharged blaster packs, datapads, datachips and... a grenade.

One of the kids nudged him and pointed at the grenade. "I can move it, mister," the little boy said.

"Move it? What do you mean?" Carth asked.

In his hand, the grenade moved, pulling his arm up. Astonished, Carth let go, and the grenade hung in the air in front of him. He looked up past it at a rusting repulsorlift crane, used to haul cargo.

"Can the rest of you do that?" Carth said. A few of the children nodded their heads. "Okay... Kid, do you think you can do this?" Carth whispered the plan to the other children, while behind them, the clashing of lightsabers hissed and sparked.

The now-armed grenade flew from his hand and towards the knot of struggling bodies. Flashes of lightsaber meeting lightsaber reflected on its surface, but none of the Sith noticed it.

"Close your eyes," Carth warned, before the flash shone pink against his closed eyelids.

He heard surprised screams, and the hiss of a lightsaber cutting through cloth and flesh. Carth opened his eyes to see the heavy arm of the crane crashing down and landing on two of the Sith, pulled down by the children using the Force.

Looking desperate instead of confident now, the last one standing threw lightning at Ban. Tired and still not recovered, Ban went down. Fresh burns blackened her uniform. The woman raised her lightsaber high for the killing stroke. Carth aimed his blasters, knowing he would be too late even as he pulled the triggers.

One of the children shot out from behind him, hands raised. A whirling cloud of dust sprang up and pelted the Sith with the debris scattered in the docking bay; plasteel containers and garbage were picked up and flung around.

With a scream of rage, the Sith turned and unleashed lightning on the small child. The storm lasted a fraction of a second, cut short when Ban rose up and cut the Sith's legs out from under her. Heart pounding, Carth ran to the little girl, dreading what he might find.

"Fools!" Ban hissed. "I did not teach you all I know of the Force for you to use it on children!" She swung her lightsaber, decapitating the woman with a single blow.

Carth had little time to spare to watch; the little girl's skin was hot to Carth's touch when he applied kolto from a medpac, and her color was bad, from what little he could see in the dim docking bay.

"How is she?" Ban asked, falling to her knees next to the little girl. Carth glanced at her; Ban didn't look much better than the kid.

"Not as bad as I thought. I think she'll make it." Carth gathered the limp girl in his arms, and looked at the headless body. "You... you shouldn't have done that. Not in front of the kids."

Ban levered herself painfully to her feet. "Violence is a fact of life. Best they learn it now rather than later." She brushed a lock of hair out of the little girl's face. "Some already know it all too well. Long before they came here."

"They're just kids."

"You are a soldier who would protect others," Ban said as they entered another docking bay. A battered freighter sat on the landing pad, with an anxious-looking Sullustan standing on the ramp. "I would teach them to protect themselves."

"Like you taught Dustil?" Carth couldn't help saying bitterly.

"Like I taught Dustil," Ban agreed, taking the little girl from his arms. "I taught him to survive, when you weren't there to protect him. Are you sorry for it?"

"I, I, no, but..." Carth stammered. He helped the children up the ramp to cover his confusion.

"May the Force be with you," Ban said as the ramp started to rise. "And... thank you."

Carth hesitated, and said reluctantly, "May... may the Force be with you."

He watched the freighter lift up out of the docking bay and fly into the sky until it disappeared from his sight.


End file.
